ND555 Impressions

How can Roon replace UPnP? I think I'll stick with UPnP. It's how Naim designed them.

Bert Schurink posted:

David O'Higgins posted:

ChrisSU posted:

Harry posted:

Roon doesn't fix anything. It's just a shell.  And a rather expensive one.

I'm not sure that it's just a shell - Roon replaces UPnP entirely with its own software. For me, I don't really feel that I need it, or that it offers anything over UPnP controlled by the Naim app, that I particularly want, but for some who have had reliability issues, it has provided a more reliable alternative.

The reliability part is a minor advantage of Roon. The best part is how it manages your listening experience, and at $495 for a lifetime licence, it’s really not expensive, especially in the context of the price of ND555 and a power supply (or Two!). 

Bert, do you not have a ‘running device’ on your network already, in the shape of whatever stores your music?

Obviously I have a Melco running in the network. But the Melco shields itself away as I have a direct Melco to ND555 connection and the network connection as such is a different port....

I'm not sure if Roon would work with the Ethernet connection running via the Melco - maybe someone has tried this?

Harry posted:

How can Roon replace UPnP? I think I'll stick with UPnP. It's how Naim designed them.

How, I have no idea, but that's what their software does, and Naim now design their streamers to be Roon endpoints as well as UPnP clients. Take your pick.

If you go to all music site, roon is the same presentation.   I use often all music site to discover some music or have informations about musicians or albums.   But i don’t need that when i stream from my serve.  I don’t use tidal or qobuz too.   Sometimes I find more accurate informations on Discogs.

ChrisSU posted:

Bert Schurink posted:

David O'Higgins posted:

ChrisSU posted:

Harry posted:

Roon doesn't fix anything. It's just a shell.  And a rather expensive one.

I'm not sure that it's just a shell - Roon replaces UPnP entirely with its own software. For me, I don't really feel that I need it, or that it offers anything over UPnP controlled by the Naim app, that I particularly want, but for some who have had reliability issues, it has provided a more reliable alternative.

The reliability part is a minor advantage of Roon. The best part is how it manages your listening experience, and at $495 for a lifetime licence, it’s really not expensive, especially in the context of the price of ND555 and a power supply (or Two!). 

Bert, do you not have a ‘running device’ on your network already, in the shape of whatever stores your music?

Obviously I have a Melco running in the network. But the Melco shields itself away as I have a direct Melco to ND555 connection and the network connection as such is a different port....

I'm not sure if Roon would work with the Ethernet connection running via the Melco - maybe someone has tried this?

Roon does not run on Melco but (!) you can run roon seperate (on a mac, on an roon appliance like sonictransport or nucleus) and point the Melco file storage to roon. Than, roon creates the metadata and you can stream to ND555. You do not need UPNP in that quotation, roon needs just a NAS share //storage/etc...

T38.45 posted:

ChrisSU posted:

Bert Schurink posted:

David O'Higgins posted:

ChrisSU posted:

Harry posted:

Roon doesn't fix anything. It's just a shell.  And a rather expensive one.

I'm not sure that it's just a shell - Roon replaces UPnP entirely with its own software. For me, I don't really feel that I need it, or that it offers anything over UPnP controlled by the Naim app, that I particularly want, but for some who have had reliability issues, it has provided a more reliable alternative.

The reliability part is a minor advantage of Roon. The best part is how it manages your listening experience, and at $495 for a lifetime licence, it’s really not expensive, especially in the context of the price of ND555 and a power supply (or Two!). 

Bert, do you not have a ‘running device’ on your network already, in the shape of whatever stores your music?

Obviously I have a Melco running in the network. But the Melco shields itself away as I have a direct Melco to ND555 connection and the network connection as such is a different port....

I'm not sure if Roon would work with the Ethernet connection running via the Melco - maybe someone has tried this?

Roon does not run on Melco but (!) you can run roon seperate (on a mac, on an roon appliance like sonictransport or nucleus) and point the Melco file storage to roon. Than, roon creates the metadata and you can stream to ND555. You do not need UPNP in that quotation, roon needs just a NAS share //storage/etc..

I was questioning whether or not Roon would work if the streamer was connected directly to the Melco, rather than both devices being connected over the network via a router or switch? I suspect Bert is using the direct connection, which Melco claim gives better sound quality.

ChrisSU posted:

Bert Schurink posted:

David O'Higgins posted:

ChrisSU posted:

Harry posted:

Roon doesn't fix anything. It's just a shell.  And a rather expensive one.

I'm not sure that it's just a shell - Roon replaces UPnP entirely with its own software. For me, I don't really feel that I need it, or that it offers anything over UPnP controlled by the Naim app, that I particularly want, but for some who have had reliability issues, it has provided a more reliable alternative.

The reliability part is a minor advantage of Roon. The best part is how it manages your listening experience, and at $495 for a lifetime licence, it’s really not expensive, especially in the context of the price of ND555 and a power supply (or Two!). 

Bert, do you not have a ‘running device’ on your network already, in the shape of whatever stores your music?

Obviously I have a Melco running in the network. But the Melco shields itself away as I have a direct Melco to ND555 connection and the network connection as such is a different port....

I'm not sure if Roon would work with the Ethernet connection running via the Melco - maybe someone has tried this?

Hard luck Dusty.

Not sure that Melco works as a "transparent" roon device to say...but Innuos runs roon and storage inside....that's my next upgrade apart from good ethernet cable....

I heard the nd555 recently, as I wrote before.  Michael, the naim technician who installed the demo, on 252/ supercap / 500dr, configured the digital volume.   I wanted to put the digital volume on no volume and use only the 252 volume.  But it was impossible.   Is it not better to use an analog volume ?

PS: to Stringerbell and Chag ( who can go to this demo too). :  I often read the audio synthèse naim forum, with pleasure. But unfortunately, for some obscure reasons, I was banished.  No serious problem.....   I continue to read you....

I asked my Dealer about Roon and had a demo - it is a nice interface and way to navigate and explore the system.

In the context of my system there is a reason I opted for the Melco to direct-feed the ND555 via Ethernet and it can't (at present) host Roon and if it is hosted to remotely control the Melco it does not sound as good as it routs the data from the Melco in a non-direct way to the ND555.

Believe me (or not) if Roon was a fix that preserved all SQ issues in my configuration of system I'd be having a home-demo of it now.

Then the people that may ask why I did not go for an all-Naim solution when the rest of my system is all-Naim - again I auditioned and preferred by a margin this configuration I have now on SQ and music abilities. But there are a few minor irritants in the control App that could be gone and my experience would be better.

This is not the end of the world stuff - I've an Engineering/science background and once I find a work-around that I can run-up to get my music going it is no more irritable as when I ran a Vinyl system and had to load the music, clean the stylus and queue it up - it became a subconscious task and you just do it.

Presently the App is my minor problem in that it blocks when not using WiFi and makes me re-register the App every time I run it up - so I have to set my fully-charged iPad to 'always on' and never minimise the App all day once I reguster for the day - then it works - and I re-charge the iPad at night.

Without the superfluous App screen-blocker which the previous App did not have it would be fine.

If I use WiFi - which I can - then this does not happen but then the audible noise and mush floor in my system is higher and I prefer it quiet. I've experimented with on and off of the WiFi and it is a silly effect that made me laugh - similar to why people run quiet 'HiFi Mains' but I'd say larger in my case.

The noise-floor was already very low after the insertion of the S1 Pre and especially the 500DR (the DR dropped the background). I'd say the ND555 is possibly also very slightly quieter than CD555 although it is more the evenness of the response that makes it more apparent.

I'm not suggesting anything against WiFi use - very convenient - but that I like to have all I paid for in terms of music SQ so run my system that way if I can.

DB.

Harry posted:

How can Roon replace UPnP? I think I'll stick with UPnP. It's how Naim designed them.

It actually does -- it uses its own protocol, they say. How much it differs from UPnP I have no idea.  

I like the Roon UI, like that I can use it from a phone, pad OR laptop (Naim App doesn't run on a laptop), like the artist and album notes (they are not totally fantastic but better than the content that the Naim App accesses by a fair bit), like the lyrics, and like Roon Radio.  Given that I already have a nas on my network, adding another box to run Roon Core (and my nas probably would have run it anyway) doesn't seem a hassle to me nor likely to degrade the sound as the hardware lives 100 feet from my ND555.

Bart posted:

Harry posted:

How can Roon replace UPnP? I think I'll stick with UPnP. It's how Naim designed them.

It actually does -- it uses its own protocol, they say. How much it differs from UPnP I have no idea.  

I like the Roon UI, like that I can use it from a phone, pad OR laptop (Naim App doesn't run on a laptop), like the artist and album notes (they are not totally fantastic but better than the content that the Naim App accesses by a fair bit), like the lyrics, and like Roon Radio.  Given that I already have a nas on my network, adding another box to run Roon Core (and my nas probably would have run it anyway) doesn't seem a hassle to me nor likely to degrade the sound as the hardware lives 100 feet from my ND555.

Have you compared the sound of your system using roon with this another box with streaming only with the naim app?  If I may ask you Bart.

Interesting. 

Harry I've a/b compared the Naim App (upnp) vs. Roon over the same network and I could not hear a difference.

This doesn't surprise me, although I would never say never until I've tried something myself. 

compared naim streaming native (upnp) vs roon: no difference in SQ for me either...

Harry posted:

This doesn't surprise me, although I would never say never until I've tried something myself. 

A nice thing about Roon is that you can try it for free.  You can run Roon Core especially just to try on any home computer, laptop, etc.  Install it on a computer and tell it that that is your "core," and install it on your iPhones / iPads.  Then from any of those devices you go to the Roon setup menu and you just point it to your nas music library.  Roon will "see" your ND555 on the network, and you can pick it from within Roon and play music on it.  The trial is free for 30 days.  That's what I did, and ended up paying for a year.  If you don't like it, etc., can just let it expire.

ChrisSU posted:

David O'Higgins posted:

ChrisSU posted:

Harry posted:

Roon doesn't fix anything. It's just a shell.  And a rather expensive one.

I'm not sure that it's just a shell - Roon replaces UPnP entirely with its own software. For me, I don't really feel that I need it, or that it offers anything over UPnP controlled by the Naim app, that I particularly want, but for some who have had reliability issues, it has provided a more reliable alternative.

The reliability part is a minor advantage of Roon. The best part is how it manages your listening experience, and at $495 for a lifetime licence, it’s really not expensive, especially in the context of the price of ND555 and a power supply (or Two!). 

Bert, do you not have a ‘running device’ on your network already, in the shape of whatever stores your music?

The way Roon "manages my listening experience" is not particularly to my liking - I prefer to manage it myself, and don't feel that Roon really adds anything I want. Other people clearly like the way it works, and that's fine, we are all different, and these preferences are entirely subjective.

Harry, what of course I meant to say is that Roon allows me to manage my listening experience better. My ND555 is connected directly to my Melco, and I don’t hear any difference using Roon vs the Naim App. When I get time, I will see if turning off the Qnap NAS on which Roon Core is running affects the sound of the Naim App.

This is all very interesting. I hope that the feedback continues. Come a long way yet so many places still left to explore.

Hey Guys, owners of the nd555:  are you using the digital volume or is it possible to use only the analog volume ( of your pre)?   Which one is better ?   Thanks 

I’ve only ever used the volume control on the 552, it’s designed for the job. Not just added to satisfy the requirements of Apple Airplay, which doesn’t seem to need it anyway.

I use the S1 Pre volume control and have not tried any digital volume control that may be available.
I recall the subject briefly arose in a discussion with my Dealer to the effect that for best results use the Preamp volume control.
But I prefer volume and music selection to be via different devices anyway, so it is fine with me to use the ND555 just as music source.

DB.

Thanks Yeti.  When I heard the nd555 on the last demo, I forgot to ask why the digital volume was configured. The volume of the nac 252 was set at minimum.

French Rooster posted:

Thanks Yeti.  When I heard the nd555 on the last demo, I forgot to ask why the digital volume was configured. The volume of the nac 252 was set at minimum.

If I understand you FR, this demo only used the digital volume control on the ND555, and the analog volume control on the 252 was overlooked. If this is correct and it was a Naim demo, it sounds very weird. But I have probably misunderstood you.

The Naim power amps need the  Naim preamp......I tried the digital dac come preamp into nap 300 did not work for me.